Preston North End’s performance offers hope for the future says Fans’ Panel’s John Roper

A first half in which the visitors looked dangerous early on and could have had a couple of penalties. But from the moment Brad Potts gave Preston the lead we looked comfortable and increasingly in control of the game.

After the break the main action was certainly at the Terriers’ end with Potts hitting the bar before Ched Evans made it two midway through the second period. Ten minutes from the end a superbly worked goal was finished off by Scott Sinclair and North End were good value for the 3-0 scoreline.

Pleasing to keep another clean sheet and with a scratch defence who have only played together twice and are yet to concede a goal. It is worth saying that the Daniel Iversen saves early on may well have had a big bearing on the game and the Dane, once again, put in a very solid performance between the sticks.

Unusually for PNE, manager Alex Neil decided to keep faith with the same side that drew with QPR at Deepdale on Wednesday evening. Iversen was the first keeper in action as early as the fifth minute with a save from Mbenza.

It was a even start to the game but after 18 minutes the visitors had a decent penalty shout turned down, followed by Iversen saving Preston again with a good save from O’Brien.

However it was North End who took the lead in the23rd minute when Evans found Sinclair, only for his shot to be saved by the keeper and as the ball fell to Potts he fired home off the legs of a defender.

No changes for North End at half time as the second half started in quite gentle fashion. It took us until the 67th minute to make the lead more comfortable as Potts broke through in the inside-left position and laid the ball back beautifully for Evans to slot home.

Gordon and Cunningham found themselves in the referee’s notebook for two indiscretions and shortly afterwards Gordon was replaced by Barkhuizen.

It didn’t take Barky long to influence proceedings as he picked up a lovely ball from Browne and with the outside of his right foot found Scott Sinclair at the back post, who made no mistake with 10 minutes to go. So a good result and a good performance from North End which shouldn’t be diluted by saying Huddersfield were poor. If things had taken a different route early on it could have all been very different.

Plenty of decent performances with Van den Berg, Evans and Potts being the standouts for me. My man of the match goes to Brad Potts who has had his share of critics recently but showed us in this game what he is all about. After Wednesday’s game, the four points this week will have helped ease any worries of being dragged into a battle near the bottom.

But with Millwall away on Tuesday and then Bournemouth at Deepdale next Saturday we must be on our mettle and try to get to 52 points as soon as possible.